Blue Skies

by Fleur McDonald

  ‘Mandy, it’s Adrian. I can’t get through to your mobile. I’m sorry I upset you. I was wondering if we could have dinner and talk about it?’ Beep.

  ‘Mandy, it’s Adrian again. Please ring me. I miss you.’ Beep.

  ‘Why aren’t you calling me?’ Beep. Tears filled her eyes at something gone so badly wrong.

  ‘Amanda, it’s Detective Burns here. I was just ringing to let you know the results have come back from the lab and we did find a partial fingerprint that definitely isn’t yours or your friend’s. The rest of the paper is clean, so I think we can assume that whoever sent the letter was trying to keep their fingerprints off the page.

  ‘Of course we don’t have anything to compare the fingerprints to – we’ve already run them through our data system and not come up with anyone.

  ‘From our previous conversation I can assure you, we will be talking to Slay Tyler, but at present we’re unable to locate him. The only thing I can suggest is that if you receive another letter you get in contact with me.’ Beep.

  ‘Well, Mingus,’ Amanda said softly, ‘this is all a bit eventful.’ She poured a glass of wine and, ignoring the chill of the evening air, went to sit on the verandah, breathing in the clean air and enjoying the sounds of the magpies singing to the full moon and their mates.

  The next day Amanda found her diesel tank had been drained and she decided it was time to call Detective Burns.

  ‘So, we’ve got a rock through your window, a cut fence and an empty diesel tank?’ he clarified.

  ‘Yep.’

  ‘Any tyre tracks that you can see?’

  ‘No, I’ve been looking but haven’t noticed any.’

  ‘Amanda, there’s still nothing I can do other than make a report so you can claim your diesel on insurance. The chances of finding the perpetrator are pretty slim. I’ll fill out the report and give you a number and we’ll look a bit harder for Mr Tyler. But if anything else happens, call me back.’

  ‘Okay.’ Amanda hung up the phone feeling rather disgruntled. What were the police for if they couldn’t help? But at the same time, she understood his position. There weren’t any witnesses – or even a motive.

  The next evening, as once again she sat on the verandah, having an evening drink, she saw Adrian’s car drive in and up to the house.

  ‘You haven’t returned my calls,’ he said.

  ‘Is there anything to say,Adrian?’

  ‘We could talk about it. See if we can work something out.’

  ‘Look, I don’t think we can. I’d like to stay friends, because I miss having you around, but I don’t think that’s fair on either of us. It’s better to make a clean break.’

  ‘You make it sound so clinical. Clean break? What about me or what I want, Mandy? I’ve waited for you so long and then you give me everything I ever wanted, for – what? An hour? I lived my dream for an hour! And then you snatched it all away without even trying to work it out. It just seems like you’ve been playing with me all the way along.

  ‘You seem to forget how you needed me – how I was your fix-it man, how I helped and guided you. Doesn’t that count for anything?’

  Amanda looked at her feet.What a horrible position to be in. She did love Adrian in a way – just not the way he wanted.

  ‘I never played you along,’ Amanda said finally. ‘You know that. You started off as my friend and stayed that way for a long time. I never once led you on – you can’t possibly believe that I did.

  ‘And yes, you were dependable and solid and I needed that. I still do – but not if it costs me Kyleena and my work.

  ‘Look, I’m sorry you’re sad. I am too. I never wanted it to end like this – yes, perhaps I got caught up in the excitement of the ring and future plans. Maybe I should have asked you about the farm and work before I said yes. But at the time I didn’t think to. And I can assure you I wouldn’t have said yes to marrying you if I thought it was going to blow into the big shit-fight that it has. I would’ve said no and hoped we could’ve still stayed friends. Maybe sometime in the future, when the hurt isn’t as strong, we’ll be able to be mates again. I’d like that, because I miss you as a friend. Goodbye, Adrian.’

  Amanda walked inside, gently shut the door and leaned up against it, breathing out heavily with her eyes shut. What a bloody mess.

  It was some time before she moved and, when she did, she realised that she hadn’t heard Adrian’s car leave. She peeked out from behind the curtains and to her horror saw him sitting in his car staring into the distance. As she watched he brought his hand up to his eyes and wiped them – he was crying!

  Amanda closed her eyes against the hurt she’d caused him. After a time, she collected the mail and sat in her father’s office, absently flicking through the latest farm magazine. As she turned another page, she came face to face with the photo that had been taken of them at Sharna’s birthday party.

  She gazed at their happy smiles and ran her fingers over Adrian’s face, then she covered her eyes so the tears couldn’t fall.

  When she looked through the curtains again, he had gone.

  Chapter 47

  Amanda raced to the house to phone her neighbour, Bill Hilder.

  ‘Hi, Bill, it’s Amanda Greenfield here,’ she announced breathlessly.

  ‘Good morning, Amanda, nice to hear from you. How are things?’

  ‘I’m wondering if you’ve seen about fifty White Suffolk rams? I went out to my ram paddock this morning and I can’t find them. I’ve been all over the farm and they’re not here.’

  ‘Could they have got through a fence?’

  ‘I’ve checked everything and I can’t see a hole, and there’s no sheep tracks or dung on the gravel to indicate that they’ve walked out the drive. So you haven’t seen them?’

  ‘Well, no,’ Bill chuckled. ‘It is only seven-thirty, Amanda; I’m still having my breakfast coffee. I lost some of my enthusiasm for early mornings when I turned sixty-five. But I’ll help you look for them, if you like.’

  ‘That would be great. They’re my sale rams – I can’t afford to lose thirty grand! I just can’t work out how they could’ve walked off the place without leaving a trace of where they’ve gone.’

  ‘Right, well I’ll be over shortly. Have you spoken to Adrian yet?’

  ‘Uh, no. I thought I’d try you first.’

  ‘Okay, I’ll see you soon.’

  Amanda disconnected then tapped the phone’s receiver against her mouth. She really didn’t want to ring Adrian. She took a deep breath. But in a case like this you couldn’t let personal relationships get in the way, she decided.

  ‘Hi, Adrian, it’s Amanda,’ she said when he sleepily answered the phone.

  ‘Mandy!’ His voice was suddenly awake and hopeful. ‘Hello, how are you?’

  ‘Fine, thanks. Look, I’m sorry to bother you, but I can’t find my sale rams. I was wondering if you or Damo might have seen them.’

  There was a silence as Adrian realised she wasn’t ringing to talk about them. ‘No, sorry, I haven’t. But then again I haven’t been out this morning. I’ll get up and have a look.’

  ‘Thanks,’ Amanda said appreciatively, then hesitated. ‘Are you okay? You’re not usually still in bed at this time of the morning. You’re not sick or anything?’

  ‘I’m fine,’ he replied shortly.

  Bill and Amanda drove up and down the road looking for some trace of the missing sheep but they came up with nothing.

  Amanda was beside herself. ‘I just can’t understand it,’ she kept repeating.

  As they returned to Kyleena to have another look along the fence line, they saw Damo at the sheep yards unloading what looked like rams.

  Amanda flew from the car and jumped into the yards, while Mingus leapt from the back of the ute and followed her.

  ‘Damo! You’re a legend! Where did you find them?’

  ‘They were wandering along Paringa’s riverside boundary. I just herded them into our yards and then loaded them onto the
ute.There’s another twenty-eight back in the yards – I couldn’t fit ’em all in one load.’

  Amanda quickly did the sums. She was still missing another fifteen.

  ‘Well it’s better to get most of them back than none at all. We can keep looking for the others,’ she said in relief. But realistically she knew if she didn’t find them it would put a serious dent in her bottom line.

  When Amanda returned to the house that night, there was a message on her answering machine from Adrian.

  ‘Amanda, I’ve got the other fifteen rams you were missing in my yards. I’ll get Damo to run them over in the morning.’

  ‘Thank goodness,’ Amanda breathed. She could rest easy; her bottom line would be okay.

  As she prepared tea, the phone rang again. It was Jonno. She smiled as she heard his voice and settled on the sofa to have a good yarn.

  Half an hour later, she remembered with a start that she’d left a gate open into the river paddock. Regretfully she said goodbye, but carried the warm feeling of his voice and the rumble of his laughter with her as she drove across the dark paddocks, her gun by her side in case she saw a fox. The grass was covered in heavy dew and the trees were silhouetted against the night sky. She pulled up at the gate and jumped out then stopped and listened. Instead of the silence she had expected there was a rhythmic thumping, like someone chopping wood echoing off the side of the river bank. She started to walk towards the noise but realised it was too far away. After a while she shrugged. It was cold and clear, and sound could carry a long way. It was probably something going on at Paringa.

  Amanda was woken the next morning by the phone ringing.

  ‘Amanda, it’s Adrian. I’m sorry; I have some bad news for you. Five of the rams that were in the yards last night are dead.’

  ‘Dead? What – how?’

  ‘It looks like tetanus. They died with their eyes open and it looks like they’ve been frothing around the mouth. I lost four lambs to it a couple of weeks ago when we were marking. Anyway, I’ve got Damo to load the others up and he’s bringing them over to you. See you later.’

  ‘Wait! Adrian, the sheep have to have open wounds to get tetanus. They shouldn’t have had anything of the sort.’

  ‘Well, I did notice a gash on one of them, just above the hock – maybe from jumping over a fence to get out. Look, I’m not a vet, Amanda, so I can’t really tell you any more than that. They’re dead. I’ve got rid of the carcases already – I can’t afford to have dead animals lying around to infect more stock. Damo will bring the others back. Goodbye.’

  Amanda swung her legs over the side of the bed and let her bare feet touch the floor. She rubbed her eyes and tried to think as Mingus lifted his head from the bottom of her bed and yawned.

  Dead sheep. No, not just sheep, rams. Five of them. A loss like that would make a dent in her budget and she still couldn’t afford that kind of loss.

  Well, no use dwelling on it, she decided. But, hell, what a thing to happen.

  Amanda waited around the shed compound until Damo arrived, busying herself with tidying up some piles of fencing gear and old iron that seemed to breed when she wasn’t looking.

  ‘Morning, Amanda,’ called Damo from his ute as he backed into the loading ramp.

  ‘Thanks for bringing these back, Damo. I really appreciate it.’

  ‘Sorry about the dead ones. Not sure what happened there. Boss reckons it was tetanus. He could be right, lookin’ at the way they died, but it was a bit quick. Tetanus doesn’t usually hit until at least three days after the bug has got into the wound. But I know the bug is around – we lost lambs to it a while ago.’

  ‘Not to worry. It happens.’ Amanda was pleased to see the others didn’t look any the worse for their adventure.

  ‘Thanks again, Damo, I’m so pleased to see them home.’

  ‘No worries.’

  Amanda set the gates up to let the rams back into their paddock and then let them out. They were happy to see the green grass and, with their heads down, moved slowly through the laneway until they found the open gate into their paddock. One by one they ambled through and made their way over to the galvanised feeder which contained feed pellets that would help them put on weight for sale condition. With a sigh of relief, Amanda shut the gate behind them. She still hadn’t worked out how they’d escaped, but now they were back in their paddock she didn’t particularly care – just so long as they didn’t do it again.

  Jumping in her ute, she turned and headed towards her oats crop. She had noticed, while looking for the rams, that it was beginning to yellow on the tips. Opening the gate into the paddock, she drove out, leaving a track of squashed oats behind her. Getting out of the ute, she bent down to inspect the leaf. It was yellowing not just at the tip of the plant, but all over.

  ‘Shit,’ she murmured. Frantically she picked one leaf and then another. She dug a couple of plants out of the ground, roots and all; they were all the same. Nothing she saw made her change her mind. This crop had been sprayed with a knock-down chemical.

  Amanda put her head in her hands. How the hell could this have happened? She tried to quell the rising panic and think logically.

  Slowly, her mind in a whirl, she drove back to the shed and looked at the chemical drums she’d used. They were lying next to the rainwater tank from which she had filled the boom spray. Every drum she checked contained the chemical she was supposed to have used. There was nothing wrong there. That could only mean it came down to operator error – she couldn’t have cleaned the boom spray out properly. The last time she’d used it had been when she was spraying a knock-down over the whole paddock. She’d used glyphosate, which killed absolutely everything – the good grasses, clovers and weeds. That sealed it: her oats crop would die. How could she have been so careless when she had been spraying for disease?

  She went back to the house to try and rework her budget. Things were not looking good.

  Chapter 48

  A sleepless night followed, and Amanda was pleased when dawn broke and she could get out of the house.

  Mingus followed her out into the misty morning, whining at the thought of jumping onto the back of the ute. Amanda was not in the mood for a whining dog.

  ‘You’re not coming!’ said Amanda more sharply than she would’ve normally. She walked over to the chain and stood there, waiting for Mingus to come, but he slunk around behind the ute.

  Amanda relented as she saw his nose peeking out from behind the back wheel. ‘Okay, you can go in the laundry. Sorry I’m taking my bad mood out on you.’ She patted him and was rewarded with a huge smile and lick as she opened the laundry door to let him inside.

  Amanda heated the engine and then turned it over, feeling the vehicle shake as the engine sparked to life and coughed a few times. It was cold too.

  Impatiently she shoved the ute into gear and sped down the driveway and towards town.

  ‘Amanda, what a surprise! Come down into my office.’ If Malcolm Mackay was at all put out to find Amanda waiting in front of the bank so early in the morning, he didn’t show it. ‘How are you?’

  ‘Fine, thank you.’ She took a seat as he walked around and sat behind his desk.

  ‘ You’re in town early,’ he observed.

  ‘I know, and I’m sorry to barge in like this but I thought you should know that I’ve had a few problems with the budget. I’ve been over it, and over it and I can’t work out where I can make up the money that I’m going to lose. I thought that -’ ‘Okay, hold up a minute. What’s happened to make you think you’re going to lose money?’

  The whole story of the oats crop poured from Amanda, including her anger at herself and the compounding fact that she’d lost five rams.

  ‘Okay, none of this is a disaster,’ Malcolm said comfortingly. ‘We can work out a new budget, which we’ll do right now. And if it shows that you need to extend your overdraft, I can’t see it being a problem considering the way Kyleena has been performing over the past couple of years.These a
re called setbacks, Amanda, and they happen to every farmer.’

  ‘I know that,’ she said miserably. ‘I just didn’t want it to happen to me. I thought I could perform better.’

  ‘No one ever wants it to happen to them – sometimes it just does. We can’t make it rain, or order the sun to shine when we want it to. As farmers we just have to take what’s given and do the best we can with it. And you do. You’ve made some really profitable decisions since you’ve been running Kyleena. So let’s see if we can sort this out.’

  An hour later, Amanda left the bank feeling much lighter and happier than when she had left Kyleena that morning. She hadn’t had to extend her overdraft – in fact, the bottom line hadn’t changed that much, despite her panic.

  Her mood dipped slightly as she turned into the driveway and saw Adrian’s car parked at the house. She groaned as she pulled up and got out of the ute. Adrian wound his window down.

  ‘Why are you here, Adrian?’ she asked.

  ‘I came to see if you got the rams back without any problems.’

  ‘Yes, I did. Thanks for sending Damo across with them.’

  ‘I’m sorry that some died.’

  ‘Me too, but not to worry, I’ll make it up in another way.’

  ‘I was wondering . . .’ He paused. ‘Would you like to go out for tea tonight?’

  Amanda shook her head. ‘Sorry, I don’t think that’s a good idea.’

  ‘Not even as friends?’

  ‘Not yet. Hopefully some day. But neither of us are ready for that.’

  ‘I can’t understand how you can just close the book on us, Amanda. You’ve really disappointed me.’ His tone was mild, but Amanda could tell he was angry.

  ‘Look, Adrian, I’ve just come back from a meeting with the bank manager. I want to go inside, have a cup of coffee, then get to work. So if you wouldn’t mind, I’d like you to leave.’

  Adrian’s face flushed but, without another word, he started his car and left.

  Amanda spent the morning updating her records according to the revised budget she and Malcolm had worked out that morning then, looking at her watch, she realised that the mail would have arrived. She threw on her jacket and walked to the mail box. It would clear her head.